Motivation for next season or collective blow to the team's psyche? Time will tell.

Marvin

Well-Known Member
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9 Jan 2006
Messages
46,683
We bottled that big time. Forget tactics and selection, we just couldn't play our normal game in the pressure- cooker situation. Liverpool's players rose to the situation, we crumbled when the pressure was on.

How will we react? I am not talking about the immediate reaction when tiredness is a factor, and when tactically the game is set up perfectly for LFC, I am talking over the next 1-2 seasons.

If you do something badly, it can scar you. We did not lose at Anfield because we didn't try, but because we couldn't play our football in a huge occasion. The self doubt is there now, and that can be very damaging when the occasion occurs again. However by the same token, this can be very motivating. Every single title-winning side for about the last 5 Premier League seasons has collapsed the next season. It also happened with Mancini's City side where within 2-3 games of the next season you could see the change in mentality.

There is no way of telling the impact of this defeat on City. It could make this team, or it could break it, and part of it will be determined by how Guardiola manages and coaches the players. And also new signings will impact on it as well

I would like to think it will make this team greater. A challenge to overcome. I'll remember last night for years to come, and I am sure the players will. It will be burned into their collective memory. I am backing this to be the spur for great things to come. There are parallels with other great sides e.g. AC Milan losing to Liverpool in the Champions League in 2005 in a nightmare and then coming back 2 seasons later and winning it.

We will have to work it out. A question mark has now been put against this team, and they have to respond in the big games to come, and I am not talking about this season, but in the seasons to come. In the big games,when a game turns against us, are we going to collapse like glass, or play through it like a truly great side?
 
We bottled that big time. Forget tactics and selection, we just couldn't play our normal game in the pressure- cooker situation. Liverpool's players rose to the situation, we crumbled when the pressure was on.

How will we react? I am not talking about the immediate reaction when tiredness is a factor, and when tactically the game is set up perfectly for LFC, I am talking over the next 1-2 seasons.

If you do something badly, it can scar you. We did not lose at Anfield because we didn't try, but because we couldn't play our football in a huge occasion. The self doubt is there now, and that can be very damaging when the occasion occurs again. However by the same token, this can be very motivating. Every single title-winning side for about the last 5 Premier League seasons has collapsed the next season. It also happened with Mancini's City side where within 2-3 games of the next season you could see the change in mentality.

There is no way of telling the impact of this defeat on City. It could make this team, or it could break it, and part of it will be determined by how Guardiola manages and coaches the players. And also new signings will impact on it as well

I would like to think it will make this team greater. A challenge to overcome. I'll remember last night for years to come, and I am sure the players will. It will be burned into their collective memory. I am backing this to be the spur for great things to come. There are parallels with other great sides e.g. AC Milan losing to Liverpool in the Champions League in 2005 in a nightmare and then coming back 2 seasons later and winning it.

We will have to work it out. A question mark has now been put against this team, and they have to respond in the big games to come, and I am not talking about this season, but in the seasons to come. In the big games,when a game turns against us, are we going to collapse like glass, or play through it like a truly great side?

Don't forget there's a second leg. That will show whether we have the mettle to be a great side.
 
I think the rub of the green had a greater impact on the scoreline than our players' performances - one Dipper offside goal given, one onside City goal disallowed, and a stoner on Sterling not given. Had we scored the latter then it finishes all square at 2-2 and we have two away goals! There are too many variables in football to fasten onto any one cause for an outcome but we are just a whisker or two between 3-0 and 2-2! We might even have benefitted from VAR!
 
I don't understand this post at all in terms of learning. What he did last night was change to a formation and system that hampered us completely.

Yep, Pep tried to learn from the league game, but tinkered in the wrong way, hence the weakness and confusion.

So he has demonstrated he can learn but he’s still got to make the correct changes, which last night he failed to do.
 
I don't understand this post at all in terms of learning. What he did last night was change to a formation and system that hampered us completely.

He hasn't learned the lesson from the league game, or he's completely misunderstood the lesson! Klippity gives him a half hour whipping in the league and then repeats a month or so later. I don't know - it could be that we were undone by individual error again, or that the players DIDN'T follow his instructions. One thing is certain he won't start lambasting a full back or a centre back!!
 
I don't understand this post at all in terms of learning. What he did last night was change to a formation and system that hampered us completely.

Sometimes you have to sit back, suck a team in and counter them with long balls to pacey wingers. Pep doesn't appear to use this tactic EVER.
 
Sometimes you have to sit back, suck a team in and counter them with long balls to pacey wingers. Pep doesn't appear to use this tactic EVER.

Because we absolutely don't have the players to play that way and it's the antithesis of what we want to do. We're an attacking team, we've got to be constantly trying to dominate the ball, that's how top teams play.
 

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